Today's machine builders face a growing litany of design and build specifications, and must provide support, troubleshooting and maintenance services that marry them to users for the operating lifetime of their machines. In this month's Control Design cover story, Executive Editor Jim Montague reports that builders and their customers, system integrators and suppliers are so inside each other's heads that in some ways they're becoming a collective entity with a common goal of curing end user headaches. Also in the January issue: Learn how building in the right access control can improve productivity and profit; discover the new paths that linear motion is taking; and decide whether PackML standardization makes sense for your machine.

Read the entire January issue now.